You Look Different in Real Life

scared. Tired. Something familiar in those eyes is gone and in its place, a vulnerability. It’s almost like I can really see her now. Some kind of transparent wrapping has been removed. Her gaze sweeps over all of us, one by one.
    Now Keira sighs, a sigh that visibly travels the length of her body, down then up. She stands, grabs her bag off the floor. Moves to the door and then out onto the sidewalk to be with us.
    I had the camera off, but now I turn it on again.
    “Hi,” she says to Nate. I think she’s expecting him to hug her but he really can’t, not with the second backpack in his hand, so now she hugs him. “Thank you for coming.”
    “Where have you been?” asks Nate. “Are you okay?”
    Keira nods. “I went to the Metropolitan Museum for a while, until they closed. I ate. I walked.”
    “But you got your mom’s message?”
    Keira nods again, a far-off look on her face now. “Yes. I kept planning to call her. Or to just go back. But I couldn’tdo it. For some reason it’s harder, now that I’ve actually seen her.”
    Nate thinks about this, and I imagine he’s projecting this idea onto his own situation, evaluating what he would do if it were his father.
    “So you guys have a car here?” Keira continues. “Can I ride back home with you? I left Lance and Leslie’s car at the Trailways station in Mountain Ridge.”
    “Ride home now ?” asks Nate.
    “Yeah,” says Keira.
    “Without seeing your mom?”
    Keira looks like a little kid caught doing something dumb, scolded for taking an extra cookie from the jar.
    “I told you,” she says, her voice growing soft, her eyes darting to the rest of us. “It’s too hard.”
    This time, it’s Felix who steps forward. “You came all this way. You actually found her. And now that she’s waiting for you to come, you’re not going to do it?”
    Keira opens her mouth to reply, but nothing comes out.
    “No,” says Felix. “We’re taking you to see her.”
    “I can’t,” says Keira, backing up.
    “This is the time,” says Nate. “This is it. We’re here and we’ll stay with you.”
    Keira looks at us one by one, and when her eyes land on me, they slide down toward the camera hanging at my side. There’s something about the way she’s looking at itthat makes me speak without thinking.
    “Finish your story, Keira,” I say. “Finish it tonight, and get on with your life.”
    She’s frozen silent for a few moments, then finally, she says simply, “Okay.”

TWENTY-THREE
    R ory is navigating us uptown to Mrs. Jones’s block, but this time she uses only her memory and not a map. Felix and I sit in the backseat with Keira wedged between us, and Nate drives more confidently now that there’s less traffic.
    After we ride in silence for a few blocks, Keira asks, “How late did she say she’d be up?”
    “Late. Come on, K. You’re her daughter. She’d stay up all night for you.”
    It’s pretty weird, crammed in next to Keira like this. She’s trying hard not to look at me, and in her efforts,she keeps glancing down at the camera. She notices me noticing.
    “So have you been shooting everything that happens?” she asks. There’s no judgment in her voice.
    “Pretty much.”
    “And what about the big reunion ? Lance and Leslie would never forgive you if you didn’t get that.”
    “It’s really up to you and your mom,” I say, and mean it.
    Keira pauses. “Can I think about it?”
    “Of course.” I want to be kind here. I want to have an interaction with her that will help, not hurt, the experience she’s about to have. “This moment is totally, completely yours. They took the other one from you, but this time you know better. Right?”
    Now Keira looks straight at me, with an expression like she’s just been punctured. Pop. She stares for several very long seconds, and I work to keep my eyes connected to hers.
    “Right,” she finally says.
    “We’re going to stay on this until Sixty-Seventh Street,” says Rory. Nate nods and picks up speed. We see nothing but green lights stretching for blocks in front of us, as if an unknown something is shouting, Go, go, go! When we finally see a red light, Nate slows, but it changes to green before we get to the intersection and he speeds up again. I put my hand out the open window, fingers spread wide, feeling the air slide through them. Felix sees me do thisand puts his hand out his window, and now we pretend our arms are wings on either side of the car and we flap them,